


A Big Universe

by Fistful_of_Gamma_Rays



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Drabbles, F/M, Gen, Short Stories, Vignettes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-01-14
Updated: 2014-05-30
Packaged: 2017-11-25 13:30:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 2,957
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/639368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fistful_of_Gamma_Rays/pseuds/Fistful_of_Gamma_Rays
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Very short stories. Various characters, various genres. Updated irregularly.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Night Out

**Author's Note:**

> Title: A Night Out
> 
> Characters: Male Shepard, Garrus, Grunt
> 
> Genre: Humor

Shepard was pretty sure Garrus hadn't actually been serious when he'd suggested their krogan problem could be taken care of by a round of drinks and a dance, but hell, it was worth trying before they subjected themselves to whatever horrifying ritual krogan went through to prove their manhood. Omega had been out for obvious reasons, so they'd headed to Ilium, which had almost as many cheap dives and marginally better odds of getting through an entire night with all your organs and most of your credits.

The decision had been impulsive - Wrex had been wearing that smug look that usually meant he was about to get the best of someone in an especially graphic way - but the longer he was here, the more he thought it had been a good idea. They were on a goddamned suicide mission. They deserved some downtime before they bit the big one.

He squinted across the bar at an asari with sky blue skin and startlingly dark eye-markings highlighted by iridescent paint.

"Her."

Garrus eyed him with something suspiciously like amusement. "You're drunk, Shepard."

"I was dead," he clarified. "I deserve a drink. Drinks. You're allowed to get drunk after you've been dead." He found the asari again after a moment's disorientation in the crowd. "Seriously, you should talk to her. Chicks dig scars."

Garrus' raised a brow plate archly. "As touched as I am by your concern for my love life, you deputized me two drinks ago."

"Oh." He frowned thoughtfully. "Maybe I should talk to her. Ask her to dance."

Garrus' whole frame shook violently, and he produced a few strange-sounding coughs before replying, mandibles quivering, "I don't think that's a good idea. But you know what? Go ahead if you want. I'll watch."

Shepard stared at him for a second, plagued by the feeling that something was off about that response, but it soon passed. "Maybe I will," he said defiantly.

Before he could get any farther, a hand clamped down hard on his shoulder and spun him around on his stool. At his side, he heard Garrus curse and get up. He found himself staring up at a tall, formidably built asari. Her other hand had a firm grip on Grunt's jowls. She looked pretty angry.

"Does this belong to you?"

The question threw him for a bit until he recalled that they were on Ilium.

"No," he said.

"Shepard," said Grunt in deafening tones, grinning widely.

Garrus sighed. "Yes, he's with us."

The asari gave Grunt a hard shove in their direction. "Well, get him out of here. He won't stop staring at the girls and he's chased everyone else off the floor."

Grunt swayed in place. "Ah heh. Heh. Heh."

Shepard drew himself up, suddenly angry at the interruption to what had been shaping up to be a fine night. "Do you know who I am? I'm Commander -"

The asari glowered and he felt his jaw snap shut. "I don't care _who_ you are. Can't you read?" She pointed to a sign over the bar. "No. Krogan. On. The dancefloor."

He blinked. "That's racist."

"It's a _safety measure_."

He inhaled, and then almost overbalanced on the stool as Garrus' hand descended heavily over his mouth.

"We'll get him home. What do we owe you for the damages?"

The asari said something cutting and things sort of blurred together after that. He had a vague recollection of leaning against Garrus and trying to explain what the lines about the halls of Montezuma and the shores of Tripoli meant. He thought he might have complimented Grunt's singing voice at some point.

It was a long trip back to Tuchanka.


	2. Requiem

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Title: Requiem
> 
> Characters: Javik
> 
> Genre: Angst? I guess?

The corridor they paced down was clean and bright, in the fashion of this cycle, but it felt fearful. It did not yet hold the sharpness of panic, but the walls beat dully with the despair and anxiety of the troops stationed here. There was a bleak familiarity to it, a bitter taste of his own time.

"Thank you for coming," said the man leading him down the hall. A junior officer, young and new to this post, lacking the weariness that pervaded the other lives here. He had filled the trip with empty babble, and Javik wished that he would either cease or make himself clear.

"The commander thought you might have some insight into the situation." The guide (Smith, he thought the man was named) cast an unsubtle glance up at Javik. "It's an honor to meet you, sir."

"Get to the point, human. For what do you require my assistance?"

Smith's steps slowed and his face stilled. "It's… well, it's easier to show you. We're almost there."

He gestured to a doorway ahead of them, the only door in the hallway with guards stationed outside it. His guide stopped and spoke to one of them. A comm exchange followed, and the door slid open.

They stepped inside past another guard and rounded a corner, and Javik felt an icy shock of rage clutch him. He drew his sidearm, but Smith shouted and yanked at him and the shot went wide, burying itself in the ceiling. He found himself breathing hard, unable to take his eyes off the thing in the center of the room.

"Explain. _Now._ "

"Our unit drops the Leviathan devices behind enemy lines," said Smith, quietly. "Usually, they all die. This one lived and surrendered to us."

There was a containment field around it, he saw now. Someone had provided a chair, and the Collector sat in it, staring blankly ahead, its hands folded incongruously in its lap. It was naked, faceless, atavistic.

His lip twisted. _I will never again see another one of my people._

"Why did you not kill it?"

"It laid down its weapon and offered no resistance."

Javik rounded on him. "You are a fool."

Smith drew back. "You want us to kill an unarmed prisoner who surrendered peacefully?" He met Javik's eyes squarely for the first time. "That's not how things work in the Alliance."

"You think to be merciful?" he spat out. "The only mercy you could have offered it is a bullet in the head. It is less than an animal."

Smith continued to meet his gaze, and he felt a grudging respect for the man. "Sir, I don't believe that. It deliberately surrendered itself. It purposefully laid down its gun when it saw us. Those are not the actions of an animal. We were hoping you could tell us if you'd heard of anything similar."

A Collector surrendering itself? The thought was abhorrent. The Collectors were the Reapers' tools, and nothing more. They could not be anything more.

"No," he said after a moment. "Never. Execute it. It will betray you." He turned on his heel, ignoring Smith's protests, but before he could take a step, a sound halted him in his tracks.

It was a dry, bestial chittering, something he'd heard hundreds of times before on the battlefields of his own time. He spun, heart pounding, and found that the Collector had moved to the very edge of the containment field, its hands raised in front of it. It chittered again, and then, haltingly, it made noises like the ones the humans of this time made. Javik watched, mesmerized, a mounting tide of horror rising in his chest as it struggled to speak.

"No," it said, its voice hoarse and whispery. "No betrayal. Alone."

"That is a lie," he said harshly. "You are the Reapers' creature."

"We saw you," it said. "We recognized you." It was staring at him, its blank gaze fixed on his own.

He recoiled as if struck. "Your existence is an insult to the memory of my people."

"Once, we were more."

_Once, we were more._ An old, bitter grief rose in his throat, and he closed his eyes against it.

"Very well," he said quietly after a moment, and forced himself to return the Collector's stare. "Give it a weapon and allow it to fight its former masters. Be ready to kill it when the time comes." He turned and strode to the exit, leaving Smith and his questions behind.

The Collector's gaze followed him, but it did not speak again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some context is probably required for this one for anyone who doesn't regularly play ME multiplayer. The Awakened Collector is a playable kit released in the last DLC. It's pretty lore-breaking, but the idea itself was high-octane nightmare fuel. (And therefore something I kind of wanted to write about.)


	3. Challenge

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title: Challenge
> 
> Characters: Shepard, Garrus

The hatch of the Triton opens, dripping water onto Shepard's pale, sharp face. Garrus watches it numbly, something cold clenched around his lungs. Death has shadowed them for a long time. In the years they've known each other, there have been hundreds of bullets fired, dozens of enemies made, too many gambles to count. But this - Shepard walking herself into the dark, angry sea behind them and sinking herself to the bottom - feels more final.

"This is a crazy idea, even for us," he tells her.

She's preoccupied with the instrument panel, checking the link-up to her suit computer, and doesn't glance up. "Can't turn back now. Leviathan's the only way off this rock."

"But, Shepard-," The protest escapes him without his meaning it to, and he belatedly swallows down the rest of it.

It gets Shepard's attention though. She stares him down from the Triton's cockpit, her eyes grey and flat with the reflection of the ocean.

"You questioning my orders?"

For a moment, they balance on the edge of that question, and then years of Hierarchy discipline and personal respect kick in.

"No," he murmurs.

Shepard keeps staring, but something in her face has shifted. "I'll be fine," she says after a moment. "Buy me time until I get back."

It occurs to him that it is the closest she has ever come to making him a promise she can't keep.

* * *

Later, he heaves her into the shuttle, heart pounding and ears full of the roaring of the monsters behind them, and helps her cough up seawater and smear the blood off her face. She looks drawn and half-dead. Drowned. He does his best to keep her from noticing how his hands shake.

"Never do that again," he tells her.

She glares at him as she coughs, and he knows she'll take him to task for that later. He doesn't have the words in him to address it right now, so he reaches out for her hand instead, willing her to understand.

She keeps glaring, but she reaches back.


	4. Spiral

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title: Spiral
> 
> Characters: Mordin, Bakara

"Seashells, Doctor?" Bakara asks.

"Colloquial term. Inexact. But descriptive. Small shelly littoral fauna common to many ecologies." Mordin's hands keep working as he talks, and he hums absently during gaps in conversation. She has become used to it.

"I know what a seashell is." She saw Tuchanka's shores once, and remembers the piles of flat, featureless disks heaped along the tideline, empty and bleached. She tries to picture Mordin walking those shores and gathering them up, but the image does not sort with the doctor's restless intensity. "Shepard is right," she proclaims. "You will be bored."

Mordin blinks. "Certainly not. Fascinating example of convergent evolution. Efficient biological design implemented in numerous chemistries. Coded in hundreds of independently evolved genomes. Logarithmic spiral effective against predators, mathematically harmonious, aesthetically pleasing."

He pauses, and she waits. After a moment, he says, more quietly, "Seashells also culturally significant in many societies. Frequently symbolize good fortune, prosperity, new beginnings." The barest of hesitations. "Rebirth."

"Hn," she says, after a moment, looking at him and thinking on that.

There is a brief stillness in the lab, and then Mordin begins to hum again.


	5. Advertisement

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title: Advertisement
> 
> Characters: Wrex, Grunt

It takes a long time for krogan to start asking "why." Grunt would be a few centuries early, even if he weren't tank-bred. It might be that canny bastard Okeer's doing, but Wrex thinks Shepard is probably to blame.

"Aralakh Company? The elders won't like that." Grunt smirks as he speaks, but there is suspicion lurking in his eyes.

Wrex grunts. The words are true. The older warriors will come crying to him like spoiled brats once they learn of the appointment. He is looking forward to reminding them of their place. But Grunt's wariness isn't stupid. It's smart enough to deserve a response.

He leans forward. "Oh, they'll squirm, boy. The elders don't like change, can't think past tradition. And that's made us sick. Weak." The memory of that fight in the Hollows, and the wet, solid shock of his knife sliding through his father's chest walks among his thoughts. A memory with weight and truth. A memory with a lesson. He lets slip a toothy grin of his own. "But the young ones, the ones whose blood is still hot - all they need is a few beatings to start thinking again."

The suspicion leaves Grunt's eyes, and he slams his fists together, grin broadening into something sharp and vicious.


	6. Danger Ahead

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title: Danger Ahead
> 
> Characters: Mordin

Alkosh chewed slowly, relishing the bitter taste and slight buzz of tarsak as he inspected the clinic. It was an ugly little building, squat and dirty like everything was down here. But the walk in front of it was clean, and the tags on the wall had been painted over. All the letters on the sign worked.

He grunted and spat the spent tarsak onto the ground. Places like that didn't belong on Omega.

It happened sometimes. Off-station do-gooders who thought Omega was the place to show off their charity. Sometimes, they even stayed. But the ones that did learned the rules.

The Suns were there to help them learn.

"Stevens. Head around to the back. Make sure we don't get any runners. Grab them if they try and we'll use them for leverage. Miska, with me."

He gave it a few minutes for Stevens to get into position before heading towards the clinic. Miska lumbered after him. A young, weedy human kid answered the door. Alkosh gave him a smile. Humans never liked the teeth.

"We're here to see the doctor."

The kid started to stammer out an excuse. Miska cleared his throat and hulked. The kid shut up.

"We'll wait," Alkosh told him, still smiling.

The kid took another look at the smile and another look at Miska. He swallowed. "Yes, sir."

The doctor was an old salarian. He strode briskly into the foyer, toweling his hands dry as he blinked distractedly at them. "Here to see doctor? Medical complaint?" The tone of voice said they were barely worth his attention. Fucking salarians.

He leaned forward and down and breathed a lungful of tarsak into the doctor's sanctimonious face. "No complaints. We're here to negotiate. See, the Blue Suns own this block. And you haven't paid your rent. So we're here to work something out."

The doctor blinked again. "I see."

Miska shouted and rammed into him, but by the time Alkosh realized there was a gun under the towel, there was a hole through his shoulder. The pain knocked him off his feet, made it difficult to see or breathe. Distantly, he heard Miska gurgle wetly behind him, and then another shot.

The doctor's legs and feet came back into his view.

"Already negotiated with your colleague at back entrance. Attempted to hold my assistant hostage."

He tried to look up, but the movement made him retch with pain. The feet took a step closer, and the warm muzzle of the gun pressed up against his temple.

"I am sorry," said the doctor softly.


	7. Old Friends

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Birthday gift for fourthage.

Wrex isn’t sure it’s her at first. The name is wrong, but that doesn’t mean anything. The roar of the arena drowns out her voice, and the stink of sweat and filtered air makes it impossible to distinguish individual scents. But then, she cuts her hand to the side and snarls, and the room shakes as the other end of the arena lights up blue. He doesn’t know the move, but the gesture is familiar. He rumbles a laugh and leans forward to watch the rest of the show.

He’s waiting for her when she gets out, leaning up against the wall across from the competitors’ entrance. When she exits, a turian and a batarian come with her. They’re sizing him up immediately, but he doesn’t pay them much mind.

“You’ve gotten flashier, Aleena. I’d remember it if you’d hit me with one of those.”

Her lip curls, and she motions the bodyguards to hold steady. “Wrex. Took you long enough to catch up.”

“Don’t flatter yourself. I’ve got better things to waste my time on.”

“That’s right. I heard you took over your little rock.”

“I heard you got one of your own.”

Aleena - Aria - gives a deliberately casual shrug. “What can I say? It’s good to be queen.”

“Heh. Maybe if most of your subjects don’t come mewling to you at every little change.”

She sneers at him. “If they’re not pissing themselves to follow orders, you must be doing it wrong. You’ve gotten soft.”

Now he lets out a real grin. “You want to test that out? Just for old times’ sake. We’ve got an arena right here. A space station you can blow up when it gets too tough for you.”

She lets a bit of biotic flare run over her hands as she cracks her knuckles. It’s theatrical, but Aleena always had a taste for dramatics. “Maybe this time you’ll manage to hit me before you run out of ammo.”

Wrex guffaws, and steps forward to clap her on the shoulder. He isn’t gentle about it, because he doesn’t need to be. The bodyguards tense up, but she glares them down and socks a fist into his ribs. She isn’t gentle either.

“You’re on,” he says. “Good to see you haven’t changed.”

The smile she gives him is too hard and sharp to call friendly, but he knows her well enough to know that it is genuine. “You too.”

They step back into the shadows of the arena side by side, the bodyguards trailing behind them.


End file.
